Hello everyone, I don't know how many of you all already do this or how many of you are interested in doing this but here is just an informative outline with step-by-step instructions that I hope will help out anyone who is wanting to breed their own mealworms!

After searching site after site and looking at pet store after pet store mealworms, as many of you already know, can get quite costly to buy. After researching them some more I also found statistics that the mealworm population has declined in the past few years leading to fluctuation in pricing. So what better way to save money and to help the mealworm population thrive then by breeding your own mealworms!

So here's the basic guideline

What you will need:~Anywhere from 500 to 1000 mealworms to start is ideal(though it's possible to do with less if your budget is tight)~Three Rubbermaid containers that are approximately 10" X 17" X 6"*IMPORTANT* DO NOT USE LIDS! Not even lids with breathing holes. This will greatly hinder your breeding process.

~Wheat bran or oatmeal substrate(I've found that wheat bran works better but oatmeal will work as well)

~Slices of baby carrots or fresh shredded carrots

~Tweezers if you are squeamish

~A sifter for harvesting the eggs

~A hygrometer/relative humidity sensor

~A warm area away from all pets including gliders

~A little time each day

Background Information:The first thing everyone should know and most likely already do know is that mealworms are not actually worms but simply the larvae form of the darkling beetle. Just like all holometabolic insects they go through four stages in their life cycle: Egg-> Larvae-> Pupa-> Adult

Let's look at these all individually:

Egg - the egg a darkling beetle is extremely tiny so don't expect to find it in your containers. They usually incubate anywhere from 1-2 weeks.

Larvae - I'm sure you are familiar with this stage because it's the tasty treat that our gliders love. Mealworms will molt anywhere from 9-20 times (also known as instars as they grow too big for their exoskeleton they molt to get a larger one) until finally they shed their final skin where it loses its carapace before curling into its pupal form. This process has too many variables, such as temperature, nutrients, size, ect., to give a direct timeline on when this stage will occur. I have found that 12 days is usually the time it takes for mine to reach this stage.

Pupa - it will look white with a slight honey tint to it when it first sheds it's carapace from it's larvae days but it will usually darken to a lighter brown through the progression in it's pupation stage. It usually takes about 1-2 weeks where it will remain in it's pupal stage. This stage is by far the easiest to handle because the pupa does not require any nourishment, and will lay dormant with little movement until preperation for the final adult stage.

Adult - the full grown darkling beetle will shortly appear after the pupa starts to wiggle and writhe. It will break free it's arm and slowly shed it's pupa exoskeleton and will appear almost white when it's fully done with the metamorphosis. After a day or two it will darken to it's blackish color. Each individual female can produce on average 500 eggs in a lifespan to start the cycle all over again!

Here's a look at the different colors and stages a meal worm will go through

How to BreedAlright now that you have the materials you need, and have a little background knowledge on mealworms you may begin to start breeding!

Stage 1 - Alright so take the Rubbermaid container you have and find a warm place in your home where you can place it that will be away from pets that will try to mess with it. It is very important to keep the area warm because it quickens the incubation period and gives you more production, but makes sure to keep the humidity levels at around 55%. Fill the container about a half inch full of wheat bran or oatmeal (microwave it first and let it cool to prevent mites, which will be discussed later) then place the mealworms on top of the wheat bran. Then cover roughly a half of them with another half inch of wheat bran. This way you can still how the mealworms are doing. Check on them daily especially after almost 2 weeks is up to see if you have any new pupa molting. Lay a few slices of carrots in every so often so they can get nutrients and this will also be their source of water. Make sure keep watch for them molting so you can move them to stage 2. The whole reason you have 3 containers is so that you can seperate the mealworms in all three of their stages. When left unseperated the larvae will mistake the pupa for food and the beetles will mistake the larvae for food and you are left with either deformed beetles that won't produce correctly or dead mealworms altogether. Also make sure that you refill the wheat bran whenever it gets low after a week or two. Note: you can also keep a smaller container that you can place the mealies that you plan to feed to your gliders and set them aside since that is the whole purpose for this, or of course you can grab them straight out of the colony. Fresh pickens of the crop!

Stage 2 - Again this is the easiest stage out of the three. You really don't need much in your pupa container except for a light layer of wheat bran and they will lay dormant for the majority of the time as a pupa, all you have to do is watch for movement and wiggling indicating it's almost time for stage 3. As soon as they shed their exoskeleton then simply move them to stage 3. Make sure to move them as soon as possible because if not they will start eating the pupa. Again if you don't like the thought of touching the beedles you can either use tweezers if you are very delicate with them, or you can use an apple that has been half eaten and the beetles will latch on to it and you can shake if off in the beetle box. Most of your beetles will be deformed and can be thrown out. I usually throw out any with the slightest imperfection because they are more likely going to die soon anyway and produce further deformed beetles.

Stage 3 - This can be the most tedious stage. In this last container lay down about 1-3 inches of wheat bran or oatmeal and again make sure to microwave it first. Those worried about not having a lid on the container with the beetles, rest assure that they won't crawl out and go all over your house. If your still worried you can also put your container over a pan of water that is room temperature to create a moat that will assure further that your beetles will not escape. After you have 10-20 beetles you will want to start separating the bedding in your beetle box from the beetles every 2 weeks. The beetles will eat the eggs if you leave them with the eggs longer then that. You will also need to be using slices of carrots every other day because the beetles eat them the most and it will be their only water source. To separate the beetles from the bedding you can use a sifter, you want to have the holes be just smaller then the beetles, if its too big it will allow beetles to fall through, too small and it will take forever. Then after you harvest the eggs you can either put them in a smaller seperate container or you can put them directly in with the stage one container, either way the cycle will begin again.

If you are wondering how many mealworms you are going to produce here is an estimate formulaBeginning with 500 please note: take into account a low mortality rate of 50%:

500 worms(1st generation) divided by 2 =250 pupae

250 pupae divided by 2 = 125 beatles

125 beatles divided by 2 = 62 females

62 females x 500 = 31,000 worms(2nd generation)

31,000 worms divided by 2 =1550 pupae

1550 pupae divided by 2 = 7750 beatles

7750 beatles divided by 2 = 3875 females

3875 females x 500 = 1,937,500 worms (3rd generation)

10% into 3rd generation would =193,750 worms

Of course that is taking in perfect condition but it's a rough estimate over a spread out timespan.

CleaningAh on to the fun part! Your worm box will start to get messy after a couple weeks, there will be a lot of worm castings on the top of your wheat bran. Mix the top layer of the wheat bran to get the worm castings back into the wheat bran so the mealworms will eat them, make sure that you leave the bottom layer undisturbed when you do this. After a month or so you will probably start to notice a gray substance on the bottom of the worm box, this is frass(meal worm poop). When the layer of frass becomes significant, scoop the bedding above the frass out into a temporary container and discard the frass *side note*(frass is also GREAT for plant fertalizer). Then pour the wheat bran and worms back into your worm box. Make sure to change the wheat bran out completely every 4-6 months.

MitesOf all the problems that you may face with your mealworm colony, grain mites are probably the most troublesome. Grain mites are about the size of a speck of flour, and will breed in practically any type of grain you put them in. They can survive being frozen, and go for months without food. You only have two defenses against grain mites. The first is to not get them in the first place, microwave your bedding before using it. This should kill any grain mites and their eggs. The second, and best option probably, is regulating the humidity. Grain mites need a level of humidity of 75% or higher to reproduce. Keeping your humidity level down to 55% and making sure there is some ventilation to where you are keeping your mealworms should prevent grain mites from hatching and reproducing as I stated earlier this is the reason why. Grain mites, because of their small size, are hard to notice until the infestation is severe. Your mealworm colony will have a distinctive smell, if that smell changes significantly to a kind of piny smell, you probably have grain mites. You will probably also notice a dusty substance forming on the sides of your box. If you do come to house mites in your colony the only thing to do to effectively get rid of them is to destroy your colony and bleach all your containers and start from scratch again. It's sad and it's frustrating but if this happens learn from your mistakes and watch your wheat bran and humidity closer next time to prevent it from happening again! This is a regular mite that is about 1 mm long This is a grain mite that is half of that size

How to monitor your humidityAlright so I added this section to help you along with monitoring your humidity! It is absolutely vital to know whether or not you have a humidity problem. A humidity problem may exist, since the humidity level will not necessarily be consistent throughout a home or building. To monitor the relative humidity level throughout the home or building, you will need relative humidity sensors, also known as hygrometers or moisture meters (which I have added to the things you will need section.) I buy the digital 800 series humidity sensors online and they are around $20-$30 last time I checked. This will give you degrees in fahrenheit and/or celsius, and also give you the percentage of humidity in the room. If you find through monitoring the relative humidity that your area within it has chronically high relative humidity (55% or more), then you will need to use dehumidifiers. Dehumidifiers will control the humidity level, which will help minimize microbiological contaminates and of course mites. With dehumidifiers, it is more effective to use smaller room units, as opposed to a single large unit that attempts to dehumidify a large area.

Edits:1/20/2011 - First edit. Edited in new How to measure your humidity section1/20/2011 - Second edit of today. ADDED PICTURES! Also added more onto the Mites section.

So there you have it! I hope this has helped anyone interested in doing this and if it's helped only one person that it has served it's purpose! I appreciate you reading all the way through this or at least skimming it because it took a lot of work to write but I hope you all enjoy it! I am open to all questions and will answer them the best I can! I will also edit this if more information comes up that I think needs to be added.

Where did you buy your sifter?? What does it look like?? Awesome write up, you should include pictures, we all love pictures!

The size of the darkling beetle is almost the size of a quarter, so all your shifter needs to have is it's holes a little bit smaller than the beetle. I found mine at Walmart, but you can find them at most deparment stores too.

Also I would LOVE to add pictures but I couldn't figure out how to get them posted on here because they are all saved on my computer. If anyone would like to explain how to place pics on here I would be glad to add some more up here

I spend about $11/month on mealworms from Jeff & Camille and for me, it's totally worth it!

(If I had a TON of gliders, I'd probably reconsider, though. As it is I'm not sure how my three little guys plow through 100+ mealies/week!)

Haha I understand and it's not for everyone, but it can be a fun science thing to do if you have younger children or if you are in to things like this! I originally had started my colony for my lizards that I use to have and they would eat through mealworms like crazy so it was just easier to breed them. But it's good that you have a place to get mealworms for your suggies that your happy with and thats all that matters!

Also just edited a new section in to help people who want to learn more about controlling humidity levels!

I have my farm somewhat started. I started with 300 worms and thn ran out so i recently ordered 1000 more. I use a sterilite 3 drawer container instead of 3 plastic containers and i crack the drawers open. My beetles are probably about the size of a dime though. With maybe a few of them almost as big as a quarter.... I will defff go get a sifter....

For posting pictures, i upload them on photobucket and put the IMG code on the body of the txt

I spend about $11/month on mealworms from Jeff & Camille and for me, it's totally worth it!

(If I had a TON of gliders, I'd probably reconsider, though. As it is I'm not sure how my three little guys plow through 100+ mealies/week!)

Haha I understand and it's not for everyone, but it can be a fun science thing to do if you have younger children or if you are in to things like this! I originally had started my colony for my lizards that I use to have and they would eat through mealworms like crazy so it was just easier to breed them. But it's good that you have a place to get mealworms for your suggies that your happy with and thats all that matters!

Also just edited a new section in to help people who want to learn more about controlling humidity levels!

Don't get me wrong, I really appreciate you taking the time to write this up. It was very informative and easy to read. I've bookmarked it for if I ever... *gulp* ...change my mind.

I spend about $11/month on mealworms from Jeff & Camille and for me, it's totally worth it!

(If I had a TON of gliders, I'd probably reconsider, though. As it is I'm not sure how my three little guys plow through 100+ mealies/week!)

Haha I understand and it's not for everyone, but it can be a fun science thing to do if you have younger children or if you are in to things like this! I originally had started my colony for my lizards that I use to have and they would eat through mealworms like crazy so it was just easier to breed them. But it's good that you have a place to get mealworms for your suggies that your happy with and thats all that matters!

Also just edited a new section in to help people who want to learn more about controlling humidity levels!

Don't get me wrong, I really appreciate you taking the time to write this up. It was very informative and easy to read. I've bookmarked it for if I ever... *gulp* ...change my mind.

Haha well I glad you enjoyed it, and maybe someday it will help if you can every stomach it

Question - I've noticed a lot of moisture build up - especially in with the larva. I use cabbage for their moisture - is that the only place it could be coming from? Or is there some other preventable reason I'm getting this build up?

I'm sorry Jana I didn't see your post until I saw it on my email! Would you be a little more specific as to wear the build up is at?

Also I may be able to answer your question with this though. I sometimes use cabbage and little bits of melon for my adult beetles but not with my larvae or pupa. Simply because when they are in their worm state they don't need as much moisture as an adult beetle needs. Do you wash your cabbage off or put any water on it at all before placing it with your colony?

I always rinse my vegetables off and let them sit and dry for a few minutes before I put them in because it allows them to retain a little more water. If you are using the drawer method I highly reccommend that you keep the drawers open about 1 to 2 inches. That is most likely to the reason for the buildup if you haven't let the moisture have anywhere else to go. Leaving the drawers open will also increase your production rate because the more air that gets to the larvae the faster they can metamorphosize. Hope this helped

This deserves another bump - I'm having success! Not only with the moisture but when I did my separation/sifting this past week a counted a least a dozen TEENIE TINY new 'baby' mealies! My mortality rate on the beetles seems to be great as well - I think I've only lost 2-3 in the past 2 weeks - with new ones almost every day!

My only trouble now seems to be many of my aliens are dying before turning into beetles, and I'm only getting 2-3 new ones out of the mealie tray per week. But I know it takes time and patience. I'll have to keep supplementing my supply for awhile, but at least I know something is working! ;-)

That's great! It's good to see your having a successful colony and that your having fun with it too haha!

I've found that the pupa have the highest mortality rate and they are the most difficult to get stable. Remember to specifically pick out the perfect transformed beetles and any deformities should be discarded so that your colony line stays pure. How many pupas do you usually have a day?

Well, since the instructions here are so incredibly detailed and easy to follow, I've decided to try doing this myself. This is day one and I've only got maybe 300 mealies, but I'm going to give it a shot.

Excellent information! You answered all the questions I had and some I didn't know to ask!

You guys are really tempting me to try this but I am a total freak about bugs. It took me a year to egt the guts to feed my gliders live mealies but now that I know hiow much they love them I am thinking maybe breeding the mealies would be a healthier thing for them. Do you promise the beattles won't escape and take over my house?

@Connie - That's my biggest concern, escapes from any of the stages. And how do you determine a deformed from a non deformed beetle or pupa.

I've been buying my live mealies from either petsmart or concord pets in the 100 container. I placed a few live mealies in some easter eggs and noticed that some of the eggs hadn't been opened. So I opened them to retreive what I thought would be a dead mealie and to my surprise I found aleins. I read about them on here (thank god), so I knew what they looked like. I was excited to see them. So I picked up one to see how it felt (expecting it to also be dead) holy alien, it moved (wiggles it's tail) only when I touched it. CREEPY!! So I just gave the aleins to the gliders and OMG did they love it.

I've been entertaning the idea of trying to start a colony and even began speaking of it out load (preparing hubby).

So I may just go ahead & give it a try. Thank you for the detailed information.

I really don't see a need to keep them in the house if you have a garage or shed. Even in the winter I would think those places would stay warm enough you wouldn't have much dead loss and you could always put a heat emitter on them.Still, I leave the beetle and mealie drawers open so they don't collect moisture, and I don't have any issues with escapees.

You guys are really tempting me to try this but I am a total freak about bugs. It took me a year to egt the guts to feed my gliders live mealies but now that I know hiow much they love them I am thinking maybe breeding the mealies would be a healthier thing for them. Do you promise the beattles won't escape and take over my house?

Right now, I have mine in 1/2 gal ice cream containers. No lids! No escapees! Not even the beetles get out!

It's been just over 2 weeks and look what I saw yesterday!!!Not many but it's better than I've had in the past.

Bad news is, I had to throw them out, along with the mealies. I found a few flakes of oatmeal that had mold on them. I don't put any water in there. Just carrot slices every other day. How did I get mold and how do I prevent it?